


The Lime Tree

by MsBee



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Humor, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-11
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2020-01-11 09:55:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18428177
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsBee/pseuds/MsBee
Summary: An android walks into a bar...





	The Lime Tree

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Castles](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3380576) by [Konstantya](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Konstantya/pseuds/Konstantya). 



‘Sam’s’ - the neon sign hung outside the entrance of the bar. The letters lit up one by one in quick flashes then paused for a moment before the whole word illuminated at once, another pause, then the sequence repeated. It might have been impressive once, if you liked retro styling, but in the artificial lighting of the space station it looked dull, as if dust had gathered on the letters a long time ago and no one had ever bothered to wipe it away.

Inside the bar was dark and quiet - no surprise given the hour, mid afternoon wouldnever be a busy time in an establishment like this. Perhaps there would be an evening rush later when people wanted to eat or cut loose with a few drinks after work. Or maybe the rush would never come and this place would just continue quietly until closing time.

A middle aged waitress shuffled between the tables, sighing occasionally. Her lack of enthusiasm was apparent in her speed as she slowly wiped and cleared from lunchtime. She stopped every now and then to speak to the few customers dotted around the place. She seemed to know them well - obviously they were regulars with nowhere better to pass the day.

Lore sat at the bar, ignoring the dull rise and fall of their chatter. On a particularly irritable day he might have turned and called them out for the noise they were making, started a fight that would have left the customers needing bandages and the bar in tatters.

Not today though. Today he frowned into the bottom of his glass, noticing distractedly that it was empty again. He was beginning to suspect that he didn’t really like whisky, but he sighed and motioned to the bartender to refill the drink.

The bartender - neon sign Sam maybe? - was a short, balding human with sharp eyes in a pudgy face. He smiled sympathetically at the android as he poured, “Woman trouble, huh, pal?”

Against his will Lore was surprised, “How do you know?”

“Owned this bar for twenty years, seen that expression on a few faces before. Some of ‘em looked even paler than you,” Sam laughed at his own little joke.

“Is that so?”

“You know what they say about women; ‘Can’t live with ‘em...’”

‘Can’t live without them,’ Lore’s positronic brain automatically filled in the rest of theancient cliche. It sounded sarcastic. He instructed it to shut up, then, as an afterthought, started to run a self-diagnostic.

After a moment his internal scan concluded - all systems operating within normal parameters.

Lore shook his head and muttered through gritted teeth, “What am I doing here?”

“Sometimes it’s best to get away,” Sam replied sagely, as if the question had actually been directed to him. “Let things cool off.”

“She already left.”

There was silence.

Lore couldn’t get drunk, definitely didn’t like the burning taste of this liquor in the back of his throat and, those factors noted, didn’t know why he was drinking at all. He swigged the whisky slowly, all too aware of the barman standing nearby, busy drying glasses with a towel but ready to listen. “She gave me a tree,” he confided suddenly, surprising himself.

“A what?”

“A lime tree. In a pot. As a gift.”

“Ok,” Sam nodded, trying not to look confused, “Why would she do that?”

“I like limes.”

“Well, sure, but don’t you have a replicator?”

Lore opened his mouth to explain, then decided against it and rolled his eyes instead, “It’s not the same.” He returned to brooding for a minute or two, then burst out, “And you’re right; why would she do that? A tree. On a spaceship. Trees grow!”

“Some of ‘em don’t get that big. Anyway, I think you’re supposed to-“ the bartender made a scissoring gesture with his hand.

“Prune them,” the waitress supplied helpfully as she deposited a tray of dirty glasses on the bar. She shuffled away again.

“That’s it. You prune ‘em and you water ‘em. Keep ‘em the right temperature. Show ‘em a bit of love and pretty soon-“

Lore let out a bitter laugh and shook his head. Nurture the plant! - had he ever nurtured anything in his whole existence? A quick check of his memory files brought back his father’s horrified and immediate ‘No’ when he’d asked if he could have a dog so many years ago on Omicron Theta. Probably a wise decision, although Lore still recalled the sting of the refusal.

No, he just wasn’t that guy. Even old Often Wrong had known it. Trusting the family disappointment to look after something living would be a big mistake.

Glancing up he caught sight of himself in the long mirror behind the bar. It was obviously old, black spots had formed under the glass, and, combined with the dim lighting, it threw back ablurred reflection. If it hadn’t been for his distinctive metallic skin tone he wouldn’t even recognise his own face.

Suddenly, it occurred to him that Ishara saw him differently to everyone else. Was there a distortion in her perception brought on by their intimate relationship - what humans referred to as rose-tinted glasses maybe?

Lore toyed with the idea for a fraction of a second then rejected it. Ishara knew what he was, had seen his fierce temper and general disregard for life many times. Yet somehow she accepted his ruthless nature with an exasperated roll of her eyes and a shrug rather than the moral outrage he’d received from his parents and most other humans he’d encountered.

He’d once asked his father why he had created an android then expected him to behaveexactly the same as a human, bound by the same limits, the same morality? Soong hadn’t had a proper answer, he’d just muttered something about not making the colonists uncomfortable.

Ishara wasn’t like that. She didn’t expect him to be someone he wasn’t or try to fix him with long lectures - she just treated him as a person and if there was any other side to him, besides the vicious killer, then maybe she saw that too. Sometimes he even thought that she liked him the way he was.

At the very least she must think he was capable of watering a plant.

Maybe the lime tree wasn’t such a terrible present after all.

 

He glanced up from his reverie and found the bartender looking at him with an expression of dawning comprehension. “So, let me see if I’ve got this straight; your girlfriend gave you a fruit tree because you like fruit, and you thanked her, told her all the reasons why it was a dumb gift, then she stormed out?”

Lore hadn’t thanked her. He found that he didn’t want to admit it. “She’s not my girlfriend,” he replied automatically. She was his comrade. His lover... Girlfriend? Pfft. Stupid, human description that made him sound like a lovestruck teenager.

Still, he mused, the tree had obviously grown in a pot wherever the hell Ishara had got it - although logic dictated it had to be somewhere on this station. If it grew on a space station in a pot, it could continue to grow in a pot on the ship. Maybe he could put it in the mess, make some space for it, the whole kitchen area had hardly been touched since the Pakled crew...left. Wasn’t Ishara always complaining that they had a dining table big enough for eight but nowhere comfortable to sit except the main cockpit or her single bunk?

Hadn’t he told her it was his ship and not to start rearranging to suit her organic deficiencies?

His silence must have spoken volumes because the bartender suddenly asked, “Think she’ll come back, pal?”

Lore glared. He wasn’t anybody’s pal and he found the man’s sympathy irritating. The truth was that he did think Ishara would return to the ship. She would wander around the shops till they closed, have dinner, leave it as long as she could - but in the end she would be tired and have nowhere else to go.

She would come back with her head held high, regretting her generous impulses toward him. Even if he followed her to her cabin and tried to fix things with mind blowing sex she would seem distant, smile less for the next couple of days and he would wonder if she regretted their relationship, if she wished she’d never left her cadre, if she thought of leaving him at their next port. In turn, he would get paranoid, sarcastic and make everything worse. They would be at odds for days before their next adventure distracted them and reset the fragile balance.

“You could buy her some flowers?” Sam suggested.

“Or just apologise,” the waitress chipped in, making one of her brief visits to the bar. “Women like a man who is mature enough to say sorry.” She shot an evil look at the bartender as she spoke and Lore realised that they were, in fact, a married couple.

“Or maybe some jewellery...” the man continued, trying to ignore his wife.

“You should think about what SHE would actually like, not what’s easiest for you!”

Lore stopped listening to them and frowned, humans and their bizarre ideas! Why would Ishara want flowers that would be dead within days? And she only really wore jewels when she was dressing up for a job, almost like part of a disguise.

He dismissed the idea of apologising too, knowing that it would require him to use the right words, adopt a grovelling tone and not say anything inflammatory. Overall it was unlikely that he would succeed. Not to mention that he didn’t think the whole situation was entirely his fault - it wasn’t like he had asked her to appear with a crazy plant under her arm, looking all pleased with herself.

Pleased, then incredulous at his reaction, then deflated, flushed, furious - and hurt. He realised now it had been that split second flash of emotion in her eyes before she stormed out that had caused this strange mood in him. Normally he would have stayed at the ship alone and gloated, counted it as a win, waited for round two when she returned, but somehow he had punctured her armour with his casual mockery.

Her reaction was as confusing as it was extreme. He was sure that he had been much, much more cruel in the past and she had just snarled back.

But had she ever given him a gift before?

She hadn’t. She probably never would again. Lore winced internally, suddenly awash with self-loathing. He didn’t care about gifts, but there she was - treating him like a person, while he behaved like a jerk. Sometimes he wondered why she stayed with him. Apart from the sex, of course.

But maybe, just for once, he could fix this without resorting to sex - not that it would be unwelcome afterwards - but maybe if he did something nice... just tried to appreciate the damn plant...

He tossed back the rest of the whisky, grimaced at the fiery taste and stood, unnoticed by the man and woman who had moved away down the bar, now seemingly set on a full scale argument. In a dark corner of his mind he wondered if he should rob the place, just to put things back on a familiar footing but actually Sam seemed to have enough problems.

Women, you can’t live with them...

 

 

 

Ishara stared at her reflection in the antique make up compact. It was silver, with beautiful swirling patterns engraved on the outside and a small mirror on the inside. Once upon a time it must have been filled with powder and a puff, now it was empty, although still useful for checking her appearance.

It had been an expensive purchase but she liked it, liked to imagine the other women who had owned it before her - vintage babes - applying lipstick, fluffing their hair, spying out a roomful of admirers without making direct eye contact with any of them.

Possessing such a trinket made her feel that she had inherited a little bit of glamour from a bygone age where women were beautiful and mysterious, and men were...

Dark and dangerous?

Now who did that describe?

“You bring it all on yourself, you know,” she muttered, glaring at herself in the tiny mirror. Her pale face stared back at her, eyes deep blue-green, full lips set in a pout, her whole expression mutinous and sour.

She never had taken criticism well. Not even from herself.

Irritated she snapped the compact shut, returned it to the depths of her handbag and tried to concentrate on her surroundings.

The restaurant wasn’t a large one, it was part of a chain that had been popular a few years back before it was edged out by the next taste sensation, but it was clean and the food was good. Most importantly it was quiet enough for Ishara to spend a whole evening sitting in a booth reading her PADD without having to buy every dessert on the menu or drink ten coffees that she didn’t want.

The waitresses had been friendly and she guessed that they would have listened with sympathy and maybe offered advice if she’d told them her troubles, but she hadn’t yet reached a low enough point to want to share her problems with a bunch of strangers.

Especially when her problems were so self-inflicted and she knew the only sensible advice when it came to Lore would be to leave him.

She didn’t want to hear it. Not even from herself.

 

They’d docked at this backwater station out of convenience. Lore wanted to install some new parts to the ship and lie low after their last heist, and Ishara was happy enough to wander round somewhere different, spending the ill-gotten gains that their adventures had brought her.

There was something generic about the stores on the main promenade, almost as if each one sold exactly the same items as the last. Feeling dissatisfied Ishara had wandered, following street signs of increasing age until she found herself in the old quarter of the station. Here the winding alleys played host to tiny, but interesting, shops. She almost missed the small street market and she sensed some surprise in the stall holders and locals as she appeared. Maybe tourists just didn’t come this way anymore.

 

The lime tree had been on a small table set somewhat apart from the other stalls at the far end of the market. A young girl with dark skin and hair, maybe nine or ten years old, stood hopefully beside it, trying to make eye contact with passers by. Most people ignored her, locals bustling home with their shopping already done, but Ishara paused, drawn in by the girl’s bright smile.

“Good afternoon, Miss.”

“Good afternoon. Are you starting your own market over here?”

The girl’s smile dimmed a little, “My father has the last stall.” She pointed back at the line of stalls and sure enough Ishara saw a man watching them, keeping an eye on the young girl. “He wouldn’t let me put these things on his stall, so I brought a table from home and made my own.”

“That was very resourceful,” Ishara complimented. Mostly to please the child she turned her attention to the girl’s wares. There were a few ivory combs inlaid with what looked like mother of pearl, a carved wooden box with a broken lid and, taking up most of the table, an assortment of tall green plants in pots. “Did you grow these yourself?” she asked.

“No, they were my grandfathers. He left them to me when he died. He had a greenhouse, but my father said we could not afford the water to keep it running, so I thought I would sell them and have the money instead.”

“I’m sorry,” Ishara murmured.

“Don’t be, he had a long life and is reunited with his fathers,” she spoke with a sing-song confidence, and Ishara suddenly recalled her own childhood. The colony on Turkana IV had been filled with poverty. People died regularly and grief had seemed like a luxury they could not afford, but then, neither she nor Tasha had possessed any religious belief to soften the harsh realities of death.

“Do you like plants, Miss?” The girl interrupted her thoughts, perhaps sensing that she was losing her potential customer.

“I- I don’t know much about them,” Ishara replied honestly. She looked closer at a two foot tall woody stemmed plant that seemed to be beginning to grow fruit. “Is that one a fruit tree?”

“Oh, yes, a lime tree, at least it will be when it grows a little more. You see my Grandfather would grow trees, sell the fruit and use the money to run the greenhouse... but my father does not wish to invest.”

“Your Grandfather sounds like he was a clever man,” Ishara answered, half to herself. “I know someone who is crazy for limes! He’ll pay an absolute fortune for them.

It was at that point, when the little girl’s face lit up, she knew she’d talked herself into a corner.

Five minutes later she was walking slowly back to the ship, minus cash, plus lime tree. It wasn’t that she minded giving the girl a good price for the plant, she had wanted to help the kid...it was just... what the hell was she going to do with a tree?

 

Her solution to the question was simplicity itself - her lover loved limes, she would give him the lime tree as a present. A little voice somewhere in the back of her head had wondered if it was a good idea, after all she and Lore never gave each other anything and he’d never expressed the slightest interest in gardening - but she ignored it, impulsively placing the pot in front of him as he sat at the long table in the mess.

He had looked up slowly from the technical schematics he was studying on a PADD, golden eyes puzzled, mouth dropping open as he took in the two foot tall leafy invader. For a second he looked bewildered, as if he had no idea how to react, then annoyance won out. His sharp “What the hell is that?” brought her back to reality with a jolt.

After that the conversation had gone downhill fast. It ended abruptly when Ishara snatched the plant pot in a fury, taking back the gift. She deposited it in her cabin, grabbed her bag and jacket and departed in cold silence, Lore’s mocking comments ringing in her ears as she transported off the ship.

She wandered aimlessly for a while, staring sightlessly in the shop windows along the station’s main promenade. Her anger drained slowly away until at last her body asserted itself and she became aware that she was hungry. A leisurely dinner had filled the rest of the evening, while she made a half-hearted attempt to read a book on her PADD, trying not to think about Lore - ending up thinking of nothing but the android.

At his best Lore was fascinating company. His unpredictable nature and ability to create mayhem made for wild times. Phaser fights, dangerous negotiations, high speed chases - Ishara had experienced it all, finding herself dazzled and exhilarated by his sheer verve and yet somehow managing not to fall behind, to stay at his side as an almost equal partner in the adventures.

It wasn’t just the action though. Occasionally, when they sat side by side in the cockpit of the ship cocooned by darkness and stars, he would talk about the most random things without bitterness or mockery, and Ishara would glimpse a gentler side to the android.

At his worst however, Lore was a total ass. She guessed that Dr Soong must have included some kind of social interaction programming when he created his synthetic son, but, unlike his younger brother, Lore had never taken the slightest interest in human behaviour patterns and spent most of his existence actively doing his best to kick back against organic norms and expectations. She wondered sometimes if he had the vaguest idea how to behave with a woman outside of his sexual programming.

Not that she had much experience in the romance department herself. Turkana IV hadn’t exactly been a hotbed of wooing and tender feelings. The main focus of her life had been fighting, loyalty to her cadre. Sex was an occasional release of tension with a willing partner but connections were brief and of secondary importance to their mission.

In some ways whatever she had with Lore was the closest thing to a real relationship she had ever experienced - not that she would have admitted it to him, it was hard to admit it to herself - but the day to day routine of living together, the constant awareness of each other’s ups and downs, surely this was what having a permanent partner entailed? Although it had to be said that Lore’s ups and downs created a rollercoaster ride no human male could ever have matched.

Maybe giving him a gift had been a step too far, she mused grimly, an impulsive projection of feelings which he did not, or could not, possess. Lore had emotions, but he was, after all, a machine and just because she was pathetic enough to wonder if hot sex and the enforced intimacy of living aboard the same ship constituted some kind of boy/girl relationship did not mean that he wondered the same.

She could already imagine the disgusted look on his face if she suggested that they were anything but travelling companions, that perhaps the occasional moments of openness they shared were symptomatic of more. If Lore had been nasty about the plant he would have a field day withtheir ‘relationship’.

It was fine though. She didn’t need sweet talk or romantic gestures. This exciting life, her moody android lover, this was what she had chosen - and even before Lore came along she had always been a soldier, a fighter. She didn’t expect softness or tender words...

Did she?

Ishara let her thoughts trail away, surprised at herself, surprised at the questions that her silly impromptu gift had raised.

It was getting late and the waitresses were beginning to put the chairs on the tables at the far end of the restaurant in preparation for sweeping the floor after closing. She stood up to pay, she would have to leave now - spare them the embarrassment of needing to ask her to go - and go back to the ship.

If Lore hadn’t locked out the transporter to prevent her from returning.

Somehow she didn’t think he would have, he had been enjoying mocking her too much. He would probably be waiting for her to come back, full of clever and cutting banter he’d thought of during the evening.

Was this really what she’d settled for?

She sighed heavily and braced herself - chin up, shoulders square - before activating the tiny transporter hidden in her ring.

 

The cargo bay that housed the transporter pad was dark and empty but Ishara noticed a change in the artificial atmosphere as soon as she rematerialised. It was warm, not roasting hot, but the temperature had definitely elevated by a few degrees. The large bay was usually the coldest part of the ship, yet now she needed to remove her jacket straight away.

Something must be malfunctioning - great, she thought sourly, now she would have to see Lore. Although at least if he was occupied fixing the temperature controls he might forget to be obnoxious about the plant.

She strode toward the interior of the ship, pausing in the main corridor to open her cabin door, dumping her jacket and bag on the bed. She was halfway through removing her boots when she realised that the lime tree had disappeared from the floor by the nightstand where she had left it.

How dare he, Ishara thought, suddenly furious again. If Lore hadn’t wanted a plant he could at least have left it for her to look after - she would rather have grown limes herself than have him destroy the little tree. She could have sold him the fruit at vastly inflated prices to pay him back for being such an ass and - what was that noise?

Was that Lore singing? If he was he wasn’t in the cockpit, the voice sounded closer but strangely muffled. Curious she went back into the corridor and crept toward the song. The mess door was open, lights on inside and she could make out words.

“-Maybe I’m amazed by the way you pulled me out of time - hung me on a line -“

As silently as possible Ishara moved to the doorway. It was almost impossible to sneak up on Lore but maybe if she just peeked her head round a little...

The mess was a long thin space with one part kitchen, one part dining room, the two sections divided by a serving counter. There were no viewports and the lighting was cool white, giving the room a sterile, clinical feel. The dining area was the most underused part of the ship - Ishara found it cheerless and took her meals back to her quarters rather than sitting alone at the long metal table which secretly reminded her of a mortuary slab. Lore didn’t need to eat and whole days could pass without him even entering. The mess had been a subject of contention between them ever since it became apparent that Ishara would be staying on the ship - Ishara keen for change to something more comfortable, Lore point blank refusing.

Ishara stared into the room, mouth dropped open. There was something wrong, so wrong that the sense of unreality was dizzying and she had to support herself on the door frame.

Someone had taken the dining area from the mess, completely taken it from the ship! In its place was a lounge with two tan coloured couches and soft lighting. At the end of the room creating a focal point there was a tall green plant in a pot. The leaves moved slightly in the warm air blowing from the temperature units in the ceiling, almost as if it were enjoying the heat.

The lime tree. Ishara felt her breath hitch strangely in her chest, as if she were stuck between a sob and a gasp. Had Lore brought it into the living area and turned up the aircon to create the right conditions for the plant? Could this be real?

“Maybe I’m amazed at the way I really need you.”

Ishara stepped through the doorway on legs that shook a little and moved forward until her hands brushed the low back of one of the couches. It felt real and, surprisingly, the tan material was strangely familiar. Wasn’t this the spare top bunk out of her quarters, the one that stayed folded up all the time? It was! Suddenly it made sense how this change had happened - in the back of her mind she had known that the furniture on the ship was all modular, Lore must have taken the unused pieces and reconfigured them.

It was real. He’d altered everything in the few hours that she’d been away from the ship. For her.

“Maybe I’m a man, maybe I’m a lonely man that’s in the middle of something - that he doesn’t really understand,” Lore lay on the floor between the two couches, the top half of his body hidden under a low table with a shiny black surface that he appeared to be syncing to the ship’s power supply. As usual he was singing softly as he worked. His outstretched foot tapped along with the rhythm of music only he could hear. Ishara still didn’t recognise the tune, but that was nothing new - Lore’s musical repertoire spanned centuries.

“Maybe I’m a man, and maybe you’re the only woman who could ever help me - baby, won’t you help me understand..” he trailed off, seeming to suddenly notice her bare feet. He slowly slid sideways, out from under the table, until they could make eye contact then lay on his back staring at her silently, eyebrows slightly raised, expression unreadable.

“This - this is great!” Ishara stuttered, still too amazed to play it cool.

“What?” he rose gracefully from the floor and seated himself on the couch, sparing a quick uninterested glance for the room, as if it had rearranged itself without his notice, “I just moved some things. I’ve been meaning to install this holo-table for a while.” He tapped in a sequence on the tabletop panel and a three dimensional start-up display appeared, hovering over the flat surface. Half ignoring her Lore began to fine tune the image, sharpening it by increments.

“Uh-huh,” she replied slowly, conveying amusement and disbelief with every syllable. “So you didn’t do this because I wanted you to?”

“Hardly. Why would you even think that?” he snapped, then spoilt it all by darting a quick look up at her face. She was smiling and his expression softened. He abandoned the table, stretched his arms out along the back of the couch and grinned smugly.

If she’d had any thoughts of getting her own back now would be the perfect time for a withering remark that would chop him down to size.

Ishara considered it for half a moment then decided to forgive him. Lore in a good mood - especially Lore doing something nice for her in a weird unspoken apology, which she was sure it was - was too rare not to savour. She crossed to the new couch and sat down on his lap, enjoying his brief surprise at the bold display of intimacy. “I like it,” she murmured, leaning in to brush her lips against his.

Lore responded then linked his arms possessively round her waist. He looked pleased with himself, as if the situation was playing out the way he had planned. He still wasn’t admitting anything though. “The dining table was a waste of space. It’ll be more practical like this - that holo-table will be very useful for viewing schematics and blueprints.”

“And the lime tree - very practical with all the heating turned up,” Ishara bantered gently.

Lore heaved a mock sigh and made a resigned, “Mmm.”

“Not such a bad idea after all?”

“Pffft,” he retorted, obviously not prepared to go that far. “It’s still your dumbest idea ever.”

Ishara raised her eyebrows, teasing him and, correctly interpreting her thought, he amended, “Ok, one of the dumbest.”

Because what could be dumber than leaving everything you knew to go gallivanting around the galaxy with an unsentimental, unappreciative, unhinged android? Even he couldn’t think of anything.

“But maybe we can make it work,” Lore added, reaching up to kiss her again.

**Author's Note:**

> The song Lore sings is ‘Maybe I’m Amazed’ by Paul McCartney.
> 
> I love Konstantya’s Lore/Ishara stories and this one is completely inspired by the settings that she created; Lore/Ishara on the ship, partners in crime, Lore loves limes and sings the Beatles - all brilliant, all not mine. 
> 
> What else can I say? This is such a weird and random fic - I saw a lime tree for sale in a garden centre and thought of Lore! Also, I was actually trying to write a Lore/Ishara adventure heist story with multiple chapters and I had them sit down in a lounge on the ship and I was like, wait a sec, does Lore even have a lounge? XD


End file.
